


Purple Paradise

by Bulletproof_BoyScouts



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Dyslexic Baek, Fluff, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-30
Updated: 2016-01-30
Packaged: 2018-05-17 03:17:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5851963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bulletproof_BoyScouts/pseuds/Bulletproof_BoyScouts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Through the purple haze, everything became clear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Purple Paradise

Life was hard for a young Byun Baekhyun. Not hard as in he had to work full time in a shitty job with next to no pay to live or he had some terminal illness. No, not at all.

  
Everyday Baekhyun would go to school with a feeling in his gut that he was going to throw up. He wasn’t of course, he just felt like it. Every morning he would roll around in bed and put on a show for his exasperated mother, who would just sigh and tell him to get up and go to school. Every morning he would purposely leave the very things that made him feel so ill deep in his desk draw, but every day his mother would grab his collar just when he was about to make it out of the door and put them in his hand with a look that said “do not argue with me”. So he would reluctantly take them and be grateful, for he really did need them, but horribly upset, for he wished he didn’t.

  
When he was walking to school he would always shove them to the bottom of his bag carelessly and toy with the idea of throwing them over someone’s garden wall. However every time he thought of it he was reminded of how angry his mother got when he accidentally lost them at school once and how long he was doomed to wash endless piles of dirty dishes. So, no, he never did throw them over a garden wall.

  
The worst, however, was when he actually got to school. He would go straight to his locker and change his books as fast as he could before practically running to his classroom to sit right at the front by the teacher’s desk. It was harder for them to get him here, what with the teacher casting his evil gaze over the entire class the whole lesson.

  
It was when everyone was finally in the room and seated that Baekhyun really found his issues arose.

  
The teacher would call out the register and everyone would answer, as usual. This was fine. Then the teacher would start the lesson.

  
This was by no means fine.

  
Here the teacher would cast a stern gaze over to Baekhyun, for he knew what Baekhyun’s problem was and it was on his mother’s personal request that he made sure Baekhyun did what he was supposed to do. So, with a great reluctance, Baekhyun would reach down and slowly pull out a glasses case.

  
Ever so slowly, taking all the time in the world, Baekhyun would open the case to reveal the bane of his existence.

  
His tinted glasses.

  
Now, you may ask, “Why are tinted glasses such a big issue?” Well you see, it wouldn’t be an issue if Baekhyun didn’t persistently get bullied for it. He used to wear his purple tinted glasses happily because it transformed what used to be a page full of fuzzy grey characters in a focus so sharp he couldn’t tell what they said into an easily comprehensible page of text, but seeing as he was the only one with handwriting so bad that he regularly got called out on it by the teacher and he was the only one who had to pause every few words when reading aloud to decipher what it said only to pronounce it wrong, he was the only one who was bullied for being “the most illiterate girl in the school” (“I’m not a girl!” he would insist, only to be laughed at and mocked by cackling boys swinging their hips and holding their finger in circles around their eyes.).

  
Baekhyun thought he could deal with the teasing and mocking when it first started. It began when he first got his overlays, coloured, plastic sheets designed to be put over a page to help him read (his were a very agreeable shade of mint-green). He found that they really did help! He thought they were terribly cool at the tender age of fourteen when everyone in the class would come up to him and ask why he had them and what they were for. He would happily announce that, “Yeah, I actually have dyslexia.” and “Sure, you can try.” (until someone tried to steal them that is, then he didn’t let anyone else have a go) because, finally! People were talking to him and they were fascinated by him, always asking questions! He was thrilled to finally be the centre of attention after so long of sitting alone, the weird one who no one was particularly fond of, and wishing someone would talk to him for longer than it took to ask him to move.

  
“What’s ‘dyslexia’?” some people would ask.

  
“Ew, is that a disease? Will I catch it if I stand too close?” other would ask (he would laugh these people off).

  
“It just means that I can’t read very well, words aren’t easy for me to understand. The lady that gave me the test told me that it takes longer for words to get from the bit full of words to the bit full of meanings in my brain and connect them. She also said that reading is so hard because some dyslexic people find it hard to look at grids and lines that are an equal distance apart and characters are written in lines,” he would explain patiently, watching as understanding or confusion came to their eyes. He was a patient boy, he could spend as long as they needed explaining.

  
There were, of course, some people who weren’t so thrilled that everyone was talking to him, even if the novelty would wear off in a few weeks and everyone would ignore him again. Those people were a group of boys who always sat in the back of the class and laughed too loudly, even during lessons.

  
Baekhyun soon found himself under constant attack through teasing and mocking and paper airplanes flying into the back of his head throughout the lessons. The paper airplanes would say things like ‘your so stupid’ (he scoffed at these) and ‘u cant even read omg I bet u cant read this’ to which he would fold them incredibly neatly in half exactly twice every single time and slip them into the paper recycling after the lesson was done.

  
Baekhyun finally got his glasses he was sixteen. He had been using the overlays for years by this point and, while they were very useful, the colour was starting to scratch off and he found that they weren’t terribly convenient when he had more than one page to read at once or he had to flick through a book. He also couldn’t use them over his laptop screen, which was very irritating considering he used his laptop to type up most of his work so he might have a fighting chance of actually being able to read it later on. He had asked his mother about it in passing one night at the dinner table and surprisingly she had agreed with minimal convincing needed.

  
It wasn’t long until he went with his mother to collect his brand new pair of purple tinted glasses from a specialist optician in the next town with a warning from his mother that, “These glasses were very expensive Baekhyun, so you had better use them.”

  
He had promised and as soon as he next got into school he whipped them out, ready for the lesson to start. Only, when it did he found the number of planes sailing towards him increased.

  
Again, everyone was fascinated and, being the patient person he was, he explained all over again.

  
He spent much of the year like that, with random people asking him about his glasses from time to time and an ever increasing pile of hatred directed at his back.

  
It was by the time he was in his last years at that school that the teasing and mocking escalated to physical violence.

  
He started coming home with bruises under his clothes and all of his books scuffed from being kicked around on the floor. He would be knocked into with whispers of “freak” and “illiterate bitch” following him around. He would wake up in the morning with aching sides and dried tear tracks on his face.

  
He hated the attention now.

  
Who would have thought that the group of boys at the back of his class could be so cruel? Baekhyun certainly didn’t.

  
This was why he was so surprised when he was standing by his locker, rushing to shove his books in and escape. He had planned on getting out of the school before any of his long term bullies appeared, however luck obviously wasn’t on his side when he heard a loud shout from the end of the hall.

  
His breathing quickened when he saw the leader, a tall guy with hair pulled back into a loose bun, sauntering towards him with a smirk on his face.

  
“Hey, Byun!” he called. “My friend here learnt a new move in his Wushu class recently and he would really like to show you.”

  
He gestured towards his friend, someone who was almost as tall as the leader with dark circles that made him look like he hadn’t slept in years. This of course made him look even more terrifying as he revealed his Wushu stick with a small smile before he launched himself forward.

  
Baekhyun let out a small whimper as the stick collided with his leg and he collapsed to the floor, covering his face as tears formed.

  
“Well, that looked like it hurt, didn’t it?” the leader said with a laugh. “You know, Byun, you look really stupid with those glasses on. No one else needs special glasses to read and yet here you are, a darling special snowflake who gets extra help from the teacher. You really are a stupid boy, aren’t you? Look at you! You’re even crying like a pathetic little girl.”

  
He laughed at that and his entourage cackled along with him.

  
“Hey, maybe you can’t understand me, do you need your glasses? Will that help you understand better, bitch?” he asked slowly, enunciating each syllable carefully and slowly. “I’ll get your special glasses for you.” He seemed thrilled by this idea, reaching out for Baekhyun’s legs to hold him down, while he reached around for his bag when a shout echoed down the corridor.

  
“What the hell are you doing?” it thundered, heavy footsteps following it and growing louder and louder.

  
“What’s it to you?” the leader demanded, taking a step back and dropping Baekhyun’s legs, who scrambled back to sit against the lockers, hands still covering his face.

  
“Leave him alone!” the voice yelled. Baekhyun looked up from behind his hands to find a boy with scarlet hair and slightly bowed legs was standing between him and the group of bullies.

  
“Oh no,” Baekhyun whispered to himself. He did not want anyone else involved if he could help it.

  
The leader scoffed at that, but Baekhyun couldn’t see his face with the stranger’s legs in the way.

  
“Whatever, let’s go,” he said eventually, shoving roughly past the stranger. At least four other pairs of feet stomped rather too close to Baekhyun for his liking as they finally left.

  
With the imminent threat gone Baekhyun found that he could now feel where the Wushu stick had connected with his thigh far more than before. As the pain started to radiate out from where it hit he started whimpering and a tear escaped his eye. Despite how painful it was though, the first thing he needed to do was to make sure his glasses were okay. He most certainly did not want to have to tell his mother he broke the glasses, even if it wasn’t his fault, so this had become something of a habit for him.

  
He found his bag had fallen just next to him so he grabbed it a practically ripped it open, only to sigh in relief when he found his glasses in their case and completely unscathed.

  
“Hey, are you okay?” the voice from before asked, only now the voice had a face. A handsome face at that.

  
“Uh,” Baekhyun stuttered, a blush rising to his cheeks when a hand was presented to him. He took it gently and it pulled him up to his full height. Sadly the face the voice belonged to was a lot higher up that he would have liked. “I’m… I’m okay.”

  
He glanced up at the face and found that it was staring down at him with furrowed eyebrows. It said, “Are you sure?”

  
“Yeah,” Baekhyun said with a little cough. He stooped down quickly to snatch up his bag, shoving his glasses back into it. “I have to go,” he said, turning and starting to walk away as fast as he dared.

  
“Wait!” the voice called however Baekhyun did not stop. “My name’s Chanyeol!”

  
Baekhyun only glanced back the handsome face one last time as he turned the corner and found that the owner, Chanyeol, was standing with a hand still held out as if it would draw him back before he was out of Baekhyun’s sight completely and Baekhyun was making his way home as fast as possible.

  
\---

  
The next time Baekhyun came across Chanyeol he had just finished being on the receiving end of a rather physical meeting with one of his bullies, a short man who looked adorable when he wasn’t flexing his insane arms and connecting his fists with Baekhyun’s delicate torso. When this guy was beating him up Baekhyun was most scared that his ribs would crack however it seemed that none of them were allowed to harm him such that if he told anyone there would be any lasting evidence. They were cleverer than Baekhyun was willing to admit, however it still hurt and sadly the glasses were still one of his priorities for two reasons. First off if he lost them or they got broken he’d get a lot more than a beating from his mother, they weren’t an especially wealthy family after all. Second of all they were honestly his only hope of being able to read at a decent pace now that his overlays were pretty much destroyed from overuse.

  
He was checking they were still intact and had just put them away again when Chanyeol turned the corner and saw him sitting on the floor looking like he had been dragged through a bush backwards.

  
“Whoa, are you alright?” Chanyeol asked, practically running over and crouching down in front of him, eyebrows furrowed in a way that Baekhyun thought was ridiculously attractive.

  
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Baekhyun sighed, standing up after a moment of staring.

  
“You don’t look fine,” Chanyeol said, reaching out to steady him when he swayed to the side. The guy had really taken everything out of Baekhyun with that beating. He was finding it hard to stand now from the pain all over his body.

  
“I’m f-” Baekhyun started only to stumble forward right into Chanyeol’s chest when he tried to walk away.

  
“Okay, you’re really not fine,” Chanyeol said, reaching for Baekhyun’s bag which he added to his own as he supported Baekhyun and started walking.

  
Baekhyun resigned himself to just following for a time but soon he was curious, they didn’t seem to be going towards to entrance. After a while he couldn’t restrain himself and blurted out, “Where are we going?”

  
“To the infirmary, of course,” Chanyeol said as if it was obvious.

  
“What?” Baekhyun screeched. “You can’t take me there!”

  
“Why not?” Chanyeol asked, honestly confused. He simply watched as the black haired boy squirmed out of his grip and reached for his bag.

  
“Because,” he started, reaching around Chanyeol for his bag, “I have to go home. My mum… Can’t know.”

  
Chanyeol simply watched Baekhyun struggle, holding the bag further and further away.

  
“At least let me treat your injuries then,” Chanyeol suggested.

  
Baekhyun seemed entirely opposed to this idea.

  
“No way! I don’t need you to do that at all, I’m perfectly fine!” he said as he finally grasped his bag and ripped it from Chanyeol’s hand. “I need to get home now, if you don’t mind!”

  
“But-” Chanyeol started, only Baekhyun was already limping halfway down the corridor. “I still don’t know your name!”

  
Baekhyun hesitated. After half a minute of Baekhyun standing and arguing with himself in his head he finally let out a small, “Baekhyun…” before he scurried away out of Chanyeol’s sight.

  
“Baekhyun,” Chanyeol said to himself, looking back at the spot Baekhyun had just been lying in. “What the hell was that then? What’s going on with you, Baekhyun?”

  
\---

  
Baekhyun was home in record time that day, despite the bruises spreading under his uniform. He just wanted to go to bed and forget today had happened. What did that Chanyeol guy think he was doing? No one got in the way of those guys and the one they wanted to bully… Look what happened to Jongdae. Jongdae didn’t live near Baekhyun anymore, his parents had insisted that they move far away when Jongdae had come home one day with a broken arm, broken nose and a black eye. It had been a sad parting, especially for Baekhyun seeing as Jongdae was one of his only long term friends and his secret crush for a good two years until he left.

  
“Why can’t that giant oaf keep to himself? He’s just making it worse…” Baekhyun sighed, as he finally pushed his bedroom door shut after greeting his mother and rushing upstairs as quickly as possible. “Oh god, I have homework!”

  
With a loud groan Baekhyun threw himself onto his bed, bag abandoned in the middle of the room. He couldn’t not do his homework and if he didn’t start soon then he would never finish by the time dinner came around, so it was with a sigh that he dragged himself over to his laptop to boot it and drag a heavy textbook from his bag. Korean Literature, my favourite, he thought bitterly as he flicked it open to the right page.

  
It was with a great reluctance that Baekhyun took his glasses from their case and put them on. His whole room was now tinted slightly purple and Baekhyun started on his homework, still cursing this stupid dyslexia every time he typed a word wrong.

  
\---

  
“Baekhyun!”

  
Baekhyun looked up with a start at hearing his name.

  
“Baek!” a familiar, deep voice called.

  
Baekhyun could now see exactly who was calling him.

  
“Chanyeol,” Baekhyun growled.

  
“Hey, how’s it going?” Chanyeol asked with a brilliant smile that Baekhyun would find far nicer if it wasn’t on Chanyeol of all people.

  
“Why do you care?” Baekhyun snapped, slamming his locker shut and stalking away.

  
“You looked pretty roughed up last time I saw you, I thought I should at least make sure you’re okay,” Chanyeol said as he followed Baekhyun, easily closing the gap between them with his ridiculously long legs.

  
“I’m fine, leave me alone,” Baekhyun sighed, turning into his classroom abruptly. Chanyeol only just managed to keep up, perching himself on the desk, much to Baekhyun’s annoyance, when Baekhyun sat down.

  
“There’s no need to be so rude, Baek,” Chanyeol huffed.

  
“There is when I want to be alone and you won’t leave.” Baekhyun made sure to put as much stress into his words as he could. Maybe Chanyeol would get his point and finally leave him the hell alone.

  
Sadly, that didn’t seem to be the case.

  
“But-” the redhead began, only to be cut off by a paper airplane sailing right towards his head and hitting him in the ear. “Ow, what the hell?”

  
Baekhyun could only watch in horror as Chanyeol unfolded it to reveal a mess of hearts and scribbled characters. There was even a carefully drawn cartoon of two people kissing in the corner.

  
“What the hell?” Chanyeol asked, glancing up to the direction it came from, only seeing some people sitting in the corner of the class room laughing their heads off. “What is this?”

  
Baekhyun, at this point, had slammed his head down on the desk in defeat.

  
“Baek,” Chanyeol tried, poking Baekhyun’s hair repeatedly. “Baekhyun!”

  
“Just-” Baekhyun sighed. “Just, give that here and go away.”

  
Chanyeol pouted at that, not that Baekhyun could see, and put the paper down. He left quietly to Baekhyun’s relief and the first thing Baekhyun did was to screw the paper full of lovey-dovey confessions and mocking words into a tiny ball of hatred and shove it deep into his pocket.

  
\---

  
The rest of the day passed far too slowly for Baekhyun, who had now started to notice Chanyeol everywhere. Across the cafeteria he could see Chanyeol with a group of other boys who chattered louder than anyone else and filled the whole room with noise to most others distaste. When he was walking through the corridors he could see Chanyeol’s flaming locks over the other students’ heads. He could even see Chanyeol through his purple tinted vision as his gaze wandered out the windows during maths to see the redhead in sports kit jogging around the field.

  
Even so, the day went far too fast as Baekhyun approached his locker with a sense of dread in the pit in his stomach. He could see his tormentors just at the end of the corridor, as if they were waiting for him. Did he really need his homework? His teachers would understand if he forgot once, right? Or would they get even angrier that he simply hadn’t bothered to try and tell his mother? Was it a risk he-

  
“Baek!” a loud and now terribly familiar voice called.

  
Baekhyun looked up in dread to see the same head of red hair that had been haunting him the whole day bouncing over towards him. Chanyeol was grinning widely which surprised Baekhyun considering he told him just that morning to stop talking to him.

  
“I thought I told you to leave me alone,” Baekhyun snapped as the corridors cleared, to his horror. “I need to go.”

  
“But I wanted to make sure you were okay,” Chanyeol said, the frown he was sporting earlier coming back. “You seemed really put out-”

  
“Why can’t you mind your own fucking business, Chanyeol? I do not need your help, okay? Go the fuck away.” With each word Baekhyun spat out he advanced on Chanyeol until his back was flush with the lockers on the other side of the corridor and Baekhyun’s face was dangerously close. Baekhyun saw something flash in Chanyeol’s eyes, but he didn’t quite know what to call it, however he was interrupted from his thoughts.

  
“A lover’s quarrel? I always knew a freak like you would be gay too! Ha, illiterate and gay, what a disappointment you must be to your mother,” a new voice joined in. Baekhyun, who had completely forgotten about the group in his annoyance at Chanyeol, now froze, face inches from Chanyeol’s as the colour drained from a brilliant scarlet to a deathly white. “Don’t worry big guy, we'll deal with the bitch if he’s giving you a hard time.”

  
Chanyeol’s neck almost seemed to snap at how fast he whipped his head to the side to stare down the equally as tall man approaching them. “You don’t know anything, so get the hell out of here.”

  
“What do you mean? I know the bitch can’t read and I know he can’t write and I know he looks like a fucking girl. It would make sense that he was gay too to top it off,” the guy laughed. “If he’s trying to get in your trousers then don’t worry, we can teach him a lesson.”

  
“What do you hope to gain by bullying him?” Chanyeol demanded, shoving Baekhyun behind him. “He’s not illiterate or a girl so just leave him alone!”

  
“Looks like the bitch has a guard dog,” the bully said with a laugh. “Listen, I don’t have time to beat you both so just leave and let us sort the bitch out.”

  
In that moment a lot of things happened. First and foremost in Baekhyun’s mind was the feeling of a large, warm hand wrapping around his own. Second was the realisation that they were running. They were running faster than Baekhyun had ever run before as they skipped stairs and flew out of the building, bags trailing after them. Baekhyun could hear the angry shouts behind him, but he didn’t look back lest he fall. He simply stared at the back of Chanyeol’s head as they ran down the street opposite from the way Baekhyun usually takes to go home. He could feel his heart nearly bursting from his chest, but Chanyeol didn’t slow down until they were in an old park.

  
With a great huff, they both collapsed to the floor.

  
Baekhyun was silent as he caught his breath back and he stared over at Chanyeol, who was looking at the sky with a hand on his heart and the other still clutching Baekhyun’s fingers in a death grip. Baekhyun couldn’t help but notice now the way that beads of sweat dribbled down Chanyeol’s face, glittering in the sun; or the way Chanyeol’s cheeks glowed a rosy red from exertion; or the way he couldn’t seem to keep a small grin off his face despite the reason that they had run further than Baekhyun imagined he’d ever have to.

  
“Baek,” Chanyeol began, suddenly turning his head to look at Baekhyun.

  
“What?” Baekhyun replied after a clearing his throat and trying to pretend that he wasn’t staring at the way Chanyeol’s Adam's apple bobbed when he swallowed; or how his hair fell in the most beautifully natural way around his head.

  
There was a long pause, in which Chanyeol seemed to be working out what to say next.

  
“Why do they bully you?” he finally asked, squeezing Baekhyun’s hand gently.

  
Baekhyun didn’t want to answer. However Chanyeol’s puppy eyes proved too much and he finally let out a sigh and said, “Well, I’m dyslexic so I can’t read very easily. I can only guess that they were jealous of me because when I first got my overlays and glasses everyone was talking to me and it ‘upset the balance’ in which I was alone and no one knew who I was other than ‘the one who can’t read’. I don’t know, maybe they just need someone to bully.”

  
“That’s not right, you should tell someone,” Chanyeol said, now sitting up and pulling Baekhyun up with him. “I’m sure your teacher would do something about them.”  
“You think he would? He’s the one who’s been so conveniently ignoring all the paper airplanes and notes being passed to me every lesson. All he does is glare at me until I put my glasses on!”

  
“Still, they’re physically harming you, Baek,” Chanyeol said, his frown returning.

  
“Why are you even here? Why do you keep helping me? We don’t even know each other,” Baekhyun sighed, pulling his hand away and reaching for his bag.

  
“I’ve seen you around though, Baek. You’re always alone and you just look like you need someone to protect you so badly. All the friends I’ve ever noticed you having have left, so I thought, ‘Hey, why don’t I be his friend? He can come and hang out with my friends too and then he won’t look so damn lonely all the time.’” Chanyeol took a breath here, his eyes boring into Baekhyun’s with more intensity than Baekhyun had even seen before. “I don’t like seeing people alone, Baekhyun and I hate people being bullied.”

  
Throughout Chanyeol’s rant Baekhyun found himself unable to do anything but sit and gape his mouth like a goldfish. There was nothing Baekhyun could say that would be sufficient to show just how desperate Baekhyun had been for someone like Chanyeol. Someone who was willing to give him attention and talk to him, even better was that he wasn’t asking about his dyslexia! While Baekhyun’s dyslexia had defined him for so long, being the only thing anyone seemed to care about when they talked to him, too scared of his bullies to try and build a relationship, he found that he really did want to get to know Chanyeol.

  
Chanyeol had a strange aura about him. It spoke of comfort when his bullies came back or when he got told off again for his schoolwork being insufficient. It spoke of house visits and video games together rather than sitting alone at home and playing by himself. It spoke of study sessions where Chanyeol would read the exercises to him and take time to explain when he didn’t understand. It spoke of the friendship that Baekhyun had been craving for as long as he could remember.

  
However, there were still people out to get him. There were still people who would beat up anyone he got close to because, “A stupid bitch like you doesn’t deserve friends. Why would anyone want to be friends with a freak who can’t read anyway?”

  
Despite that, Baekhyun found himself staring at Chanyeol as he panted lightly. He was getting worked up over Baekhyun, for Baekhyun.

  
Baekhyun thought then, that this could work.

  
\---

  
“This isn’t going to work.”

  
“Why not?”

  
“It’s just not,” Baekhyun huffed, falling back onto Chanyeol’s bed.

  
“We were doing just fine though, what’s wrong,” Chanyeol asked from the desk chair, textbook propped up on his knees.

  
“I just don’t get it,” Baekhyun whined, rolling over onto his front.

  
“What’s not to get though?” Chanyeol said, looking down at the text book again.

  
“I’m so bored of this Chanyeol, we’ve been at it for hours!” Baekhyun complained.

  
“It’s been about-” Chanyeol checked his watch. “-twenty minutes, Baek.”

  
Baekhyun only huffed again and rolled around on Chanyeol’s bed until the taller sighed and snapped the textbook shut.

  
“Fine, what do you suggest we do, genius?” Chanyeol demanded, putting the text book on his messy desk.

  
“I don’t know, anything but more literature, please,” Baekhyun said, finally sitting up with his glasses askew and his hair a mess. Chanyeol chuckled at the sight and took the glasses off gently before pouncing on him.

  
Baekhyun yelled and squirmed, trying his best to wiggle his way out from under Chanyeol, but he was too late. Chanyeol had already begun his assault on Baekhyun’s sides, tickling them until Baekhyun was begging to be released with tears running down his cheeks.

  
“Well, that was a nice break, back to work,” Chanyeol said, getting up abruptly and picking up the text book again.

  
“No!” Baekhyun whined, drawing it out as he fell back onto the bed again.

  
“Do you want another then?” Chanyeol asked with a grin, wiggling his fingers at Baekhyun, who gasped.

  
“No way.”

  
“Fine then, we’ll do literature.”

  
“Fuck you.”

  
\---

  
Baekhyun soon found that most of his time was filled with Chanyeol. He had been introduced to Chanyeol’s friends, who were all more than willing to chatter his ear off whenever they saw him and with the constant presence of at least one other person in Baekhyun’s life, his bullies didn’t find many chances to get to him again. The only issue was, when they did manage to get him alone, the beatings were worse than ever before.

  
“You finally found someone to protect you, did you?” one of the bullies, the one with a stony face and a stupid haircut, said as he cornered Baekhyun by his locker. Much to Baekhyun’s disappointment, Chanyeol wasn’t there nor were any of his friends or anyone else for that matter. The hall was empty.

  
“I-I… Uh,” Baekhyun was at a loss for words as he stared back at the much taller bully with his mouth gaping like a goldfish.

  
“It’s a shame they aren’t here now, isn’t it?” he said. He seemed to be amused by the situation, but Baekhyun couldn’t quite tell. He didn’t really care either. “What was it you said you have again? Dys-what? Dyswacksia? Dyspraxia?”

  
“It-it’s called dyslexia,” Baekhyun responded automatically, his voice no more than a whimper.

  
“Do you really think I care?” He chuckled at this. “Anyway, I’ve been waiting to get you alone. I want to have a bit of a play.”

  
At that he brought back his fist and threw it forward, right towards Baekhyun’s face.

  
It collided with an almighty smack.

  
“Oh, it does feel good to do this again after such a long time, although,” he frowned, “Wu told us not to hit your face or hands. Oh well, not much that can be done now.” He laughed. “I guess I’ll have to help make your ‘I fell down the stairs’ story a bit more believable.”

  
This naturally lead to a thorough once over on Baekhyun’s body, which had been a more healthy peach colour as opposed to the splotchy blue and green and yellow it had been. Of course, it wouldn’t look so healthy now, not for a few weeks.

  
By the time he was done Baekhyun was once again on far too familiar territory, the ground under somebody's’ foot. He couldn’t bring himself to get up, even half an hour since the bully had vanished around the corner. He just lay there until the cleaning lady came and jabbed him in the side with her wet mop, telling him to ‘move the hell out of my way before I shove my mop places no mop should ever have to go’. (He never really liked the cleaning lady anyway.)

  
He was out of the school gate in the next five minutes, being hurried out by an impatient teacher who apparently had very important business to attend to and simply could not be held back any longer. When his bag stopped swinging from his shoulder he finally opened his eyes, having closed them from the pain of the mop in his delicate side and a rough teacher pretty much kicking him out. What he saw was certainly surprising.

  
Chanyeol was there, just outside the school standing with his coat pulled tight around his shivering body and hair a mess. He had waited for Baekhyun.

  
“What the hell are you doing here?” Baekhyun cried, jumping back a bit when Chanyeol looked up at him with one of the most disarming expressions he had ever seen. “You were supposed to go home like an hour ago!”

  
“Actually-” he lifted a hand to check his watch, “about twenty minutes ago.”

  
“Whatever,” Baekhyun huffed. “Still though, why are you still here?”

  
“Ah,” Chanyeol rubbed his neck, “actually I was waiting for you.”

  
“For this long? Why didn’t you just go home when I didn’t turn up?” Baekhyun had started meeting Chanyeol after school near the beginning of their friendship. Either he would go to the front gate and Chanyeol would already be waiting or Chanyeol would come and meet him at his locker.

  
“Oh, uh,” Chanyeol started, “I didn’t want to just leave you behind and I didn’t know where you were so I waited.”

  
“What if I had already gone home, you idiot? You must be freezing…”

  
“No, I’m fine,” Chanyeol said with a sheepish grin. He still couldn’t seem to hide his occasional shivers though, despite pulling the jacket tight around himself. “I wanted to ask you if you wanted to come to my house!”

  
“Your house?” Baekhyun hesitated. He had only been to Chanyeol’s house once before. Usually the two went to Baekhyun’s house or the library.

  
“Yeah! My parents are out of the country for a few days, so I thought it’d be a perfect time to invite you over.” At this Baekhyun remembered a previous conversation where he had asked Chanyeol about his family and he had told Baekhyun that his family didn’t know the meaning of personal, so he would rather put off introducing them.  
“Oh… Sure, I’ll need to call my mum though.”

  
“You can use my landline,” Chanyeol offered as they started walking. “It’s not like anyone else will be using it anyway. Oh! Last night I tried baking some cookies and I think you should try them! It was really difficult though, the first batch was burnt so I had to try again…”

  
As Chanyeol began rambling, Baekhyun found it was harder and harder to keep his eyes off Chanyeol’s side profile as he laughed about his burnt cookies. Despite the bad foot Baekhyun had admittedly started them on, he had quickly found just how difficult it was to dislike Chanyeol. With his infectious laughs, bright smiles and sweet looks over a lunch that Chanyeol had made just for Baekhyun one day when Baekhyun mentioned that he often left home too quickly in the mornings (trying to avoid his mother) to grab his lunch, Chanyeol had wormed his way deep into Baekhyun’s heart. Baekhyun wouldn’t admit it, but perhaps the lingering touches and the warm smiles they exchanged were not as platonic as Baekhyun was insisting they were.

  
“Baekhyun?” Chanyeol called, seemingly not for the first time, as Baekhyun suddenly came back to reality. They were standing at a crossing and the light had just gone green, signalling them to cross, but apparently Baekhyun had been too busy staring to notice. “Baek, we have to cross, before it goes red.”

  
“Huh? Oh, yeah,” Baekhyun said with a sheepish grin. “Sorry, I spaced out.”

  
They were soon across the road and back on their way to Chanyeol’s house, but this time Baekhyun didn’t let his mind wander and he kept his focus on the pavement under his feet.

  
\---

  
“Do you like them?” Chanyeol asked, a small smile on his face as Baekhyun nibbled at the slightly burnt cookie. It was chocolate though, so he couldn’t complain too much.  
“It’s really good,” Baekhyun admitted, taking a larger bite.

  
“Ah, that’s good,” Chanyeol said with a laugh, “because I baked them for you!”

  
Baekhyun choked a bit on the chocolate chip he was eating.

  
“What?”

  
“Yoora-noona said-” Chanyeol froze. “Ah, never mind!” He laughed awkwardly.

  
“Who?”

  
“Uh,” Chanyeol hesitated, “Yoora-noona is my sister. She moved out a while ago though.”

  
“Oh, I see,” Baekhyun replied, nodding. “Why haven’t you told me about her before?”

  
“No reason?” Chanyeol said, even though it sounded much more like a question.

  
“Right.” Baekhyun chuckled. “We should do some work.”

  
“Oh, yeah, sure,” Chanyeol said, suddenly far less awkward than before.

  
\---

  
“Baek,” Chanyeol started. They were halfway through their maths homework when he called his name.

  
“Yeah?”

  
“Has anyone ever told you that you look really cute with glasses?”

  
Baekhyun actually looked up at this, dropping his pen onto his text book.

  
“I-I… Uh…” Baekhyun stuttered. A blush was spreading too quickly across his cheeks for him to pretend that it was the room that was too warm.

  
“They suit you,” Chanyeol said, grinning as he watched Baekhyun’s mouth gape like a goldfish. A flustered goldfish. “Actually you look cute without them too.”

  
Baekhyun’s cheeks felt like they were on fire; his whole body felt like it was on fire. He was a bit surprised that he hadn’t already combusted or melted. He wanted to disappear down through the bed with every word that came out of Chanyeol’s mouth, sadly though, that was very unlikely to happen.

  
“Hey,” Baekhyun snapped out of his thoughts, “are you alright?” Chanyeol asked, reaching over to touch his arm.

  
“I- Uh, I mean… Yes, I-I’m okay,” Baekhyun mumbled tripping over his words and hardly able to formulate a thought because all that was going through his mind was hand, arm, Chanyeol, hand, what, cute, he thinks I’m cute, touching my arm, Chanyeol-

  
“Baekhyun,” Chanyeol called. “Stop spacing out all the time, it’s not good for you!”

  
“Ah, sorry!” Baekhyun squeaked, blush increasing tenfold.

  
“How cute…” Chanyeol muttered under his breath, not loud enough for Baekhyun to hear as he leaned back and let go of his arm.

  
Baekhyun however couldn’t seem to get back to his work as Chanyeol had. Chanyeol had let go of him after he apologised and gone back to doing his maths questions while Baekhyun was left floundering after the encounter. Maybe this relationship wasn’t so platonic after all…

  
\---  
The next time Baekhyun went to Chanyeol’s house was a month later. Chanyeol’s parents had finally gone out of the country again (“To visit family,” Chanyeol had said.) and the two had taken that as a golden opportunity to spend time sitting on Chanyeol’s bed, pretending to do work.

  
“Can we take a break now?” Baekhyun asked, turning to stare at Chanyeol through his purple tinted vision. Chanyeol looked up from his text book after a few seconds and laughed at Baekhyun’s pouty face, glasses almost falling off the end of his nose.

  
“Sure,” he replied, moving all the textbooks to the floor as he flopped down onto his bed. “What do you want to do then?”

  
“I don’t know,” Baekhyun sighed, joining him and deliberately dropping his arm directly onto Chanyeol’s chest.

  
“Ow, that hurt, you meanie,” came Chanyeol’s cry.

  
“Who even says meanie anymore?” Baekhyun teased, laughing and rolling over onto his side facing Chanyeol, who turned his head to look at him.

  
“I do,” he said, scrunching his face up in a way that made Baekhyun’s heart squeeze almost painfully. “Why, is that a problem?” He reached over and poked Baekhyun’s nose with the last word, his smile lighting up the space between them so brightly that Baekhyun had to turn away.

  
“No,” he replied softly, turning all the way over to face the wall. He couldn’t let Chanyeol see him so flustered, not when Chanyeol was the cause of his distress.

  
After a few minutes of silence Baekhyun heard Chanyeol calling his name softly along with feeling a hand shaking his shoulder. When Baekhyun did turn around he saw that Chanyeol had sat up and was staring at him with a peculiar look in his eye that Baekhyun couldn’t place. It was a look he had seen often however, from one of their very first encounters when he had backed Chanyeol up to the lockers in an effort to make him leave. It had haunted him somewhat since then, almost always present yet it had come to be something he accepted and appreciated for it was a warm and gentle look that made him feel safe. Even so, there was still a part of him that was desperate to know what would cause someone to have such a look in their eye.

  
“Baek,” Chanyeol said. They had been staring at each other, both trying their best to place the look that each saw in the other’s eye.

  
One moment Baekhyun was laying on the bed, staring up at Chanyeol, however the next, he was sitting up, two hands holding his shoulders carefully as their lips met. It was a soft kiss, an innocent kiss of two people who had been longing to show their gentle affection for too long. Baekhyun could feel everything that he thought Chanyeol would be to him and so much more through the light touch, but it was too much for him as he jerked away quickly.

  
“Ch-Chanyeol…” he whispered, bringing a delicate hand to his mouth.

  
“I’m sorry!” Chanyeol cried, his own hands flying to cover the whole of the lower half of his face.

  
Silence encased them, the whole world freezing as their hands slowly dropped from their faces as they finally understood the look in their eyes. It was love, affection, admiration and infatuation. It had taken them altogether too long to finally place the lingering touches, the prolonged glances. They were drawn to each other after that first meeting in which Chanyeol had turned up like a beacon of hope, flaming red hair and all. It was especially obvious to Chanyeol’s friends, who saw their interactions, the constant game of ‘how much physical contact can we make even when it’s unnecessary?’ and how naturally their relationship progressed after the first hurdle of getting comfortable together.

  
It now became apparent to the two boys, sitting and staring at each other, that this had been a long while coming. From the cookies to the tickle fights. From the way Chanyeol always seemed to appear after an encounter with Baekhyun’s bullies to help him to Chanyeol’s patience when helping him with his homework. When they thought about it, this wasn’t surprising. They had been in a state of being happy enough to be around each other and not wanting to risk their friendship for months, but now that careful balance was overturned.

  
“Baek…” Chanyeol tried, wanting to fix whatever had just happened, but he trailed off quickly when Baekhyun shifted forward again, glasses still askew.

  
“Shut up, Chanyeol,” Baekhyun said, however there was no venom in his voice as he reached up and tangled his fingers in Chanyeol’s hair.

  
He paused when their faces were inches apart, Baekhyun staring into Chanyeol’s eyes through the purple lenses, however he found that now he didn’t need the glasses to read Chanyeol’s eyes. Everything was clear to him as characters on a coloured page.

  
Suddenly, he surged forward, kissing Chanyeol again with more force than before. It took Chanyeol a second to respond, however when he did, they lost themselves in each other.

  
\---

  
“Chanyeol,” Baekhyun began, brushing the hair off Chanyeol’s forehead with delicate fingers, “I should go soon. I’ve been here for hours.”

  
They were both laying on Chanyeol’s bed, curled up in each other’s arms. They occasionally shared a gentle kiss, soft whispers floating between them.

  
“No, it’s been like-” Chanyeol lifted his arm and checked his watch. “Well, okay it’s been a few hours. Stay though, please?”

  
Baekhyun smiled at this, pecking Chanyeol’s lips quickly before saying, “It depends. I don’t know that I want to spend my time with you.”

  
“I’ll bake you some more cookies? Yoora-noona said that-” He froze, similarly to last time, like he was about to let out a giant secret.

  
“What did she say?” Baekhyun asked, a chuckle leaving him at the sight of a slightly flustered Chanyeol frozen, ears starting to glow red.

  
“Uh-”

  
“Tell me!”

  
“She said that you should do nice things for someone if you like them, like buying them flowers or baking them cookies…” He trailed off near the end, the red tinge spreading quickly across his entire face.

  
“So…” Baekhyun started, a smirk crossing his face. “You like me?”

  
“What? Of course I do! Have you seen yourself in those glasses? It’s too cute, I swear,” Chanyeol said with a laugh, watching as Baekhyun’s face became as bright as his own.

  
“Stupid dyslexia…” Baekhyun muttered. Honestly, if he wasn’t dyslexic then he would never have had to suffer at all! He certainly wouldn’t have met Chanyeol though and that was something he was sure he wouldn’t trade for the world.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!  
> This is in fact the first fanfiction I have posted in years (its marginally better than the last thing I let loose onto the internet) so I can only hope that it doesn't seem as messy as I think it does.  
> What I wanted to focus on most in this fic is dyslexia! You don't tend to see many fics where the protagonist has learning difficulties and I thought I'd try and change that by talking about my own experience with dyslexia. I haven't been bullied actually, in fact pretty much everyone has supported me, however I'm well aware that people can be mean, hence why Baek was bullied in this fic. I might go further with the concept of characters with learning difficulties depending on how well this one goes and whether I feel like it.  
> Either way, I really do hope you enjoyed reading it!  
> Thank you :)


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